Speaking at a fringe event at the party's annual conference, John Hayes claimed local solutions, as opposed to national intiatives, are best placed to support disengaged young people.
He said: "Provision needs to be accessible. That's why I've focused our apprenticeships policy on small and medium enterprises. That's why I will focus our Neets policy very much around the smaller voluntary, charity and community based organisations."
Hayes added that young people need to be prepared for work in the type of industries that can provide jobs in their local area.
He slammed Labour for concentrating too much on qualifications targets, at the expense of young people's real training requirements.
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